


autumn

by ikeracity



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, post-XMA
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-05
Updated: 2018-02-05
Packaged: 2019-03-13 20:46:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13578618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ikeracity/pseuds/ikeracity
Summary: Post-XMA. Erik and Charles share a quiet moment on an autumn morning.





	autumn

**Author's Note:**

  * For [JackyJango](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JackyJango/gifts).



> Originally posted on tumblr [here](http://ikeracity.tumblr.com/post/170499458419/its-too-cold-for-you-to-come-out-here-without-a) for the prompt: “It’s too cold for you to come out here without a jacket on.”

“It’s too cold for you to come out here without a jacket on.”

Erik didn’t startle. He must have felt Charles coming long before he’d heard him. Keeping his back turned, he said with a soft, wry edge to his voice, “What, are you going to offer me yours?”

“Then  _I’d_  be cold,” Charles teased. “No, I brought yours.” He wheeled his way carefully over to Erik, fighting against the resistance of the uneven path. Normally he’d never venture out this far on his own—too much effort, too little reason to make the trip—but he’d sensed Erik out here and he hadn’t been able to resist. Besides, he wasn’t on his own, not with Erik here.

Erik glanced down when Charles reached his side. After a moment, he took the worn leather jacket that Charles offered up to him and sighed in quiet recognition. “You still have this?”

“It held up well in the explosion, didn’t it?” Charles could still remember the first time he’d seen Erik in that jacket, over twenty years ago. He’d been so striking then, lean and trim and steely-eyed, wrapped in neat slacks and turtlenecks and this delicious leather jacket that had accentuated his broad shoulders and narrow hips.

Not, Charles thought ruefully, that Erik was any less striking now. Age had hardly touched him. He had a few more lines around his eyes and mouth, but he was still as stunning as he’d been when Charles had pulled him from the water all those years ago. Practically still the same man.

No, that wasn’t true. Physically, perhaps, he had barely changed, but in other, deeper ways, emotionally, mentally…

Erik took the jacket, slid it on. It fit perfectly.

For a long few minutes, they stood—well, Charles sat—on the edge of the woods that bordered the lawn, staring out into the wilderness. Autumn was starting to make itself known in the form of browning leaves and a brisk, nipping wind that felt especially harsh against Charles’s sensitive, still-bald scalp. His hair was starting to grow back, albeit very slowly, and it wasn’t nearly enough to keep him warm. He fought back a shiver, not wanting to disturb Erik’s contemplation.

“She would have liked this,” Erik said finally. Charles didn’t have to ask who—he could see the little girl’s face in Erik’s mind’s eye: round and pink-cheeked, with mischievous dark eyes. “She liked the woods.”

 _She would have been welcome here,_ Charles wanted to say, but he didn’t know if such words would only be painful. So he held his tongue.

“The deer were her favorite,” Erik continued, his gaze very far away. His voice was even, but the grief that throbbed through every corner of his mind was agonizing. A lump rose in Charles’s throat and stuck there. “But she was friends with everything. Owls, foxes, even the smallest mice. Nothing was too insignificant for her attention. Every life had meaning.” Erik took a long, shuddering breath.

 _What is the meaning of mine?_ he thought, with such pain that neither of them could breathe for a moment.  _To suffer? Is that all there is?_

Charles closed his stinging eyes. He ached to reach out to Erik, to run a soothing mental touch over the deeply wounded surface of Erik’s mind, but he wasn’t sure if that sort of comfort would be welcome. All he could think to do was sit with Erik, and endure with him.

“What?” Erik said hoarsely after a minute. “No platitudes?”

“Over the years, I’ve found that I say the wrong things to you more often than not,” Charles replied carefully. “So perhaps it would be better if I said nothing.”

That startled a brief, amused smile out of Erik. “Really? Charles Xavier with nothing to say?”

“I know quite well that I have a reputation for never shutting up,” Charles sniffed, “but contrary to popular opinion, I do indeed close my mouth from time to time.”

“Even when you have nothing to say, you still talk.”

Charles opened his mouth to retort, then shut it again, eyebrows raised. Erik’s brief smile returned, and stayed longer this time.

After a long silence, Erik said, “The mansion’s nearly done.”

“You and Jean have done a good job with it.”

“She’s a quick learner.”

“Yes, she is.” Charles paused, then added softly, “You’re a good teacher.”

Erik gave him a cool look. “Are you trying to recruit me?”

Charles smiled. “Aren’t I always?” Always trying, at least. Succeeding—now that was another matter entirely.

“I’ll need my room back,” Erik said after a moment.

Charles blinked. “What?”

“If I’m going to stay,” Erik continued, as if he weren’t shaking the foundations of Charles’s world, “I’ll need my room back.”

 _If I’m going to stay._ Charles took a trembling breath and clenched his gloved hands tightly around the rims of his wheels to steady himself. Somehow, even with his heart racing madly, he managed keep his voice calm. “Of course. Anything you want.”

“No classes. I don’t want to teach. Maybe sometime later but…not yet. Not now.”

“All right.”

“And after the house is done, I need some time away.” Erik hesitated a moment, then swallowed audibly. “I need to go back to Poland. I have unfinished business.”

That sounded ominous, but Charles felt no violent intent in his thoughts, only a fathomless sadness. Erik had left Poland in a hurry after Apocalypse had seized hold of him. No doubt there were still matters Erik wanted to put to rest.

“I’ll buy you a plane ticket,” Charles said. “Or you can take the X-Jet if Hank’s finished repairing it in time.”

Erik met the offer with a wordless nod. After a minute, Charles said tentatively, “Erik, I don’t mean to overstep, but if you’d like…I could go with you. If you would rather not be alone.”

Erik smiled humorlessly. “What? Afraid I won’t come back?”

Yes, that was always the fear, wasn’t it? But that wasn’t why Charles had offered—or not the only reason why, at least.

“You don’t have to be alone,” he said softly.

Part of him expected Erik to scoff. Even when they’d first met, Erik had had a hard time believing such words, and now, twenty years later, Erik’s cynicism had only deepened. But to his surprise, Erik nodded and said, “I know.”

Charles swallowed. “Then…”

“I’ll think about it.”

“All right.”

Erik glanced down at him then. It was the first time he’d really looked at Charles since the conversation had started. He seemed startled. “You must be cold.”

“A little,” Charles admitted. The wind had picked up slightly, much to his displeasure.

“You’re not even wearing a hat.”

“I haven’t got one.” When Erik raised an eyebrow skeptically, Charles huffed a laugh. “Most of my things couldn’t be salvaged from the wreckage, and I haven’t exactly had the time to go clothes shopping.”

Erik turned. “Let’s go back then,” he said, his voice a gentle grumble, “before your ears freeze off.”

Charles smiled and turned his chair to fall in beside Erik, who shortened his stride to allow Charles to keep up. “Yes, let’s.”

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [autumn (not yet remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15234570) by [Unforgotten](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unforgotten/pseuds/Unforgotten)




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